But World Trade Organisation membership means Australia is bound by strict trade laws that do not allow for tariff barriers to be imposed, unless it can be shown that so-called 'safeguard measures' are required to protect a domestic industry at risk of serious injury, as a result of "unexpected and unforeseen increases in imports".

The Productivity Commission is the Australian body with responsibility for determining whether safeguard measures are justified.

The Commission is expected to provide its report to the Commonwealth "as soon as possible and, in any event, within three months", according to a joint statement released by Trade Minister Craig Emerson and Assistant Treasurer David Bradbury.

Paul Barratt has been appointed as an Associate Commissioner to undertake the inquiry, and any interested party can register to make a submission.

SPC has released a statement saying it hopes the Productivity Commission will rule in its favour.

"A lot of people say you can't have trade barriers and protection," he said.

"We are not looking for that.

"We are looking for some relief at the moment, where we meet the challenges of the high dollar and activities from other countries that are really looking to muscle in on our industry."

Observers such as trade consultant Peter Gallagher, warn that proving temporary tariffs are warranted is difficult.

"The Productivity Commission has got to determine whether there's been an increase in imports of the two products, processed fruits and tomatoes.

"Then they've got to establish whether the increase in imports was due to some unforseen circumstances.

"They've got to determine whether the fruit growing industry, for example, is either suffering from what's called 'serious injury', or is threatened with 'serious injury'.

"And finally, they've got to determine whether there's a link between the increase in imports and the injury, if any, being suffered by the industry," Mr Gallagher says.

While the decline in food processing in the Goulburn Valley and elsewhere is plain, the causes are less clear-cut.

While Mr Gallagher says the facts won't be known until the Productivity Commission report is complete, he says that on the face of it, it may be difficult for industry to prove that the increase in imports was "unexpected and unforseen".

"Imports of tomatoes don't seem to have changed all that much since about 2008.

"Processed fruit does seem to have seen a big increase in import volumes, maybe 30 per cent or more, but that's been happening all this time, so is that unforseen?" he said.

"And as for whether [what's happened qualifies as] 'damage', this idea of injury to an industry is an old fashioned concept. A lot of us would call it competition."

Since the rules around emergency tariffs have been in place, no Australian application for emergency safeguards has succeeded.

The last group to try, in 2008, was the pork industry, and Alan Oxley, head of trade consultancy firm ITS Global, was involved in putting that case together.

"We found that when [pork product] tariffs were cut, it wasn't expected that the Europeans would have imposed additional subsidies to support their production, but the Productivity Commission simply wouldn't consider that," he said.

Mr Oxley says the significant increase in the value of the Australian dollar over recent years would most likely not be enough to allow the fruit processing industry to qualify for tariff protection.

He says the Productivity Commission's rules and revisions around emergency safeguards, introduced over the past decade, "frankly make it quite difficult for any Australian company to be able to receive treatment under those provisions."